A Courage More Precious
by Pawkun
Summary: Post GD: Lysithea has nightmares. Sometimes they aren't something she can face alone. Thankfully, she isn't alone anymore.


Her eyes are heavy, and she's barely able to squint at the man in the plague doctor's mask standing in front of her. Her wrists and ankles burn from the ropes holding her spread eagle against the table, tied tighter than needed intentionally.  
"Lysithea von Riegan… I will not ask again. How did you expel the crests from your body?" The man in the mask says. He leans forward, the black eye slots of his mask staring into the mage's own. Lysithea gathers what energy she can to respond, however when she tries she coughs. They'd been rough with her, trying to beat the information they want from her. The fact that she was only her bed clothes didn't help matters, the thin fabric did nothing to protect her from the leather gloved fists of the 'doctor' and his men.  
"I…" Lysithea manages to get out. "Prayed really, really hard and" she's cut off as the man slaps her across the face. She gasps in pain, and hates herself for giving him the satisfaction of knowing it hurt.  
"Fine. If you do not value your own life, maybe you value his?" The doctor says. Across from Lysithea is Claude, hanging from the ceiling by tied wrists. He's in the silk pants he wears when they sleep and shirtless. Blood coats the left side of his face, a cut on his forehead left to bleed.  
"Cl…Claude!" Lysithea gasps through the pain in her cheek. He doesn't reply.  
"He's still passed out it seems. No matter. The crest infusion will certainly wake him up." The doctor says, placing tools against Claude's chest that live in Lysithea's darkest memories. Fear for her beloved gives her adrenaline and through the pain she shouts at the doctors.  
"Stop! Don't do this! Shambalah is gone, there's no reason!" She pleds. The doctor turns over his shoulder. Somehow, Lysithea thinks the mask smiles.  
"The reason is simple. You were never supposed to survive, and here you are. So now we must start again with him." The doctor says and a spell circle appears below him. The tools glow with a sickly purple light and Claude immediately awakens, screaming in pain. Lysithea feels the tears roll down her face as her own screams and begging blend with Claude's cries-

* * *

"Lyssi!" Lysithea hears, from a voice that's supposed to be crying out from the pain of having crests forced on him. Her eyes, heavy with tears, whip open to see Claude's emerald eyes wide and looking into her own. She panics, trying to move, trying to get away from their captors. Claude wraps his arms around her tightly as she flails about, tears blocking her vision. As they fly from her eyes, she starts to piece together the world around her husband, the familiar walls of his and her bedroom in the Riegan manor, their bed sheets, and a lack of blood on Claude's face. Breathing comes back to her slowly and her tears reduce enough her vision isn't entirely obscured. She realizes she'd been clawing and pushing at Claude in her panic, hesitating only for a moment before wrapping her arms around him. He pulls her up to a sitting position, arms tight around her, letting her press her face into his shoulder blade. Claude whispers lightly to her, rubbing circles into her shoulder.  
"You're safe Lyssi… No ghosts, nor ghosts of the past here… We're safe…" Claude says. Lysithea's breath hitches as he says 'safe' and she sobs anew. He keeps a tight hold on her, surrounding her with his warmth and presence. This was what he could do. An easy quip and a wink don't calm this kind of storm, nor the observations of a compulsive schemer. The best thing he can give the love of his life is his presence, his warmth, so she knows that so long as he is alive he will stand beside her and protect her. To speak with actions, for a man known for his silver tongue, is the most pure kind of expression he can make.  
Clouds move aside from the skylight above them, lighting the room in soft moonlight. It seems to relax Lysithea as her sobbing calms and she soon simply sits nestled in his arms. Lysithea turns her head against Claude's chest, looking out into the room as his heartbeat fills her ears.  
"Another one?" Claude asks quietly. Lysithea nods, Claude feels it against his chest more than sees it.  
"But…" Lysithea says, he voice drained from the tears. Claude waits, slipping her hair behind her ear. "This time they… they had you Claude." Claude frowns, out of sight of Lysithea.  
"Me? What would you want with me? Unless they have a grudge about the whole Shambalah thing, but that was more Teach than-" Claude's cut off as Lysithea thumps her head against him.  
"They used you against me. They were going to do what they did to me all those years ago to you Claude." Claude doesn't reply immediately so Lysithea speaks up again. "These dreams… They've done a lot of things to me. Some as worse, if not more terrible than what was done to me as a girl. But this… that was my breaking point Claude. I can't imagine you suffering this curse the way… the way I have." Lysithea starts to trail off, her eyes somehow wet again just from the image. Claude pulls them backwards, leaving Lysithea facing him on the bed, between his legs. He takes both of her hands in his own, rubbing the scars of her once crests with his thumbs.  
"So long as we are together, we shall never be taken by surprise. We've survived a coup, a war, defeated a literal legend… No mere mage can hope to overcome us." Claude says, looking into Lysithea's pink eyes with the softest smile he can portray.  
"But if" Lysithea starts, but Claude cuts her off.  
"If we were to disappear, Leonie, Raphael, Marianne and Ignatz, Hilda, and even Lorenz would come find us. Leonie is rooting out Shambalah sects all across Fodlan after all. And that's not even bringing into account Teach." Lysithea frowns.  
"And if" She starts only to be cut off again.  
"And if, all else fails, we are taken by Those Who Sliver in the Dark… So long as you live they can do anything they want to me. Because I swore I'd always be by your side, and no mortal or immortal being can prevent me from doing so, so long as you live." Claude says, unable to resist winking. Lysithea flushes, still frustrated but the red her face at least ease Claude that she knows he's only speaking from his heart.  
"No matter your arguments, these are… these are still my fears Claude. No matter how many ways I tell myself it could never come to pass, I still have these nightmares week after week." Lysithea says. "While I will never doubt you'll fight to the bitter end to protect me," Lysithea smiles softly at him while she says so, a smile Claude doesn't see frequently and relishes in every moment he can, "having you taken from me is akin to death itself." Claude stops circling her scars, uncharacteristically frozen. Lysithea takes his right hand in both of hers, pulling it to her chest.  
"You are my heart as much as I yours. While I know you wish to reassure me, that you'd ever be lost to me is more terrifying than all the crests in the worl-oof" Lysithea says, cut off as Claude pushes them both forward, his arms wrapping around her again as they lie beside each other.  
"I'm so sorry, Lysithea" Claude says, his voice unusually husky with concern. "So long have I been looking for solutions to problems alone, striving to reach the future I desired that I forget my life is no longer just my own."  
Lysithea smiles, rolling into her husband, letting his arm wrap around her stomach. "And I thought you and Professor had a special bond."  
"Nothing as special as ours, my love." He says into her neck, sending a pleasant charge down her spine.  
"Rightly so." She murmurs. They rest like this as the clouds again block the moonlight from filling the room, wrapped up in each other and listening only to the sound of one another's breath.  
"What can I do, Lyssi? How can I take your pain from you?" Claude says when the clouds roll again.  
"What you've already done, my love" Lysithea says. "You are here, and I sleep knowing no matter what fears I face while I sleep, you will be here beside me when I wake."  
"But what can I do to keep you from those fears? Keep you from ever having to suffer them?"  
Lysithea smiles. "Nothing Claude. My demons are my own, and you can't face them for me." She feels his grip around her tighten and she rotates to face him, noses almost touching. "But when you stand beside me, you give me courage. Courage to face the demons and live on, so that we may enjoy the long live you fought so hard to give me, together. That courage is more precious than steel, dragon bone or crest." Claude only looks at her, his eyes reflections of his very soul. It's so rare for him to be lost for words, his eyes truly reflecting the man beneath the smiles and winks of a seasoned leader. Lysithea loves these moments. She kisses Claude, freeing him from his confusion and they soon lose themselves in one another's eyes, as the clouds obscure the moon for the rest of the night.


End file.
